Young PR Pros is back from its long break. Where were we you might ask? Kristine D’Arbelles, founder and co-host of Young PR Pros, has been off having an amazing adventure. The adventure of motherhood. Kristine gave birth to a beautiful boy late May.

We jump right back into the swing of things, with an episode jammed packed with great advice for entrepreneurs. We invite Ross Simmonds back for his third episode as guest host to share his experience as an entrepreneur and offer advice for young professionals looking to follow that path. Ross is a communications and marketing strategist and entrepreneur. You might know him as @theCoolestCool on Twitter.

While reading an article in the International Association of Business Communicator's magazine, Communication World, Kristine has noticed a trend in the millennial generation - more and more of her friends are option for the consultant root and gaining experience before getting permanent jobs. This new trend might stem from en employer's need to see real experience on a young professional's resume. For those of you jumping into the world of consulting, read and listen on.

We start with Ross, an entrepreneur himself, who had this to say about entrepreneurship:

It is the best thing for your career and will make your resume stand out.

Technology has made consulting easy - build a worldwide clientele.

Build up a reputation for yourself - build your brand through social media and blogging. You don't need to be an expert, just be out there.

Julia Kent consulted for a year at the beginning of her career and said:

Companies nowadays - mostly non-profits and small businesses - don't have big budgets and look for freelancers and consultants all the time.

Do you have plans this summer? Don’t forget to visit youngprpros.ca and catch up on old episodes. Go back to class September with fresh new ideas and succeed in your career.

This week, our hosts Kristine D'Arbelles and Julia Kent welcome on the show for the second episode in the row - Ross Simmonds. Ross is a communications and marketing strategist and entrepreneur. You might know him as @theCoolestCool on Twitter. Ross has agreed to join us from Halifax as a superb guest host to help bring new views and opinions to the show.

For episode 101, we discuss the best PR and communications campaigns. A few weeks ago, our host and roving reporter Kristine attended the University of Ottawa Public Relations Association (uOPRA) conference Connect 2 Success. The one-day conference brought together professionals from all industries of PR and communications to talk about what young professionals need to be successful in their future careers. At the conference she interviewed speakers, experts and panelists and asked them to share the best PR or communications campaign that has resonated with them throughout their careers. You can find video footage of all the interviews mentioned in this episode on our website, or on our YouTube channel.

The examples ranged from the great Tylenol crisis communications taught in all PR classes, to Dear Future Mom a campaign promoting Down Syndrome Day, to an award-winning campaign that aimed to make tea more popular than coffee, and even the Obama presidential campaign. Kristine, Julia and Ross added to the list. Here are a few campaigns we think are the best campaigns ever:

This week, our hosts Kristine D'Arbelles and Julia Kent record their 100th episode. Young PR Pros wants to thank our guests, listeners and anyone who has helped spread the word about our podcast. We hope we can continue to share our knowledge with young PR and communications professionals for another 100 episodes.

For our special anniversary show we invited an engaging new guest host, Ross Simmonds, to join our conversation.

Ross will be tagging along for the next few episodes offering his ideas and opinions on various topics that are important for young PR and communications professionals. We hope he spark new conversations and offer different perspectives on future topics.

This week's topic:

This week's topic has divided the world of PR and communications for decades now: does accreditation really help our industry?

Without missing a beat, Ross jumps in and shares his belief that accreditation is just a money grab scheme from large associations. Kristine is a little bit more on the fence and believes that accreditation might weed out those who bring a bad name to the industry. Julia makes an obvious comparison between accreditation and post-secondary school diplomas - in the end it is experience that matters, not a piece of paper.

Listen to the full episode to get in on the heated debate, and then share your opinion.

Are you victim of routine? Do you feel like your career isn't moving? Maybe it is time to refresh your career.

In episode 99, our hosts Kristine D'Arbelles and Julia Kent take inspiration from IABC's Communication World. In the March issue, IABC interviewed Mark Schumann who talks about the three Ds to ensure his career and communication functions move forward: diagnosis, development and delivery.

Kristine and Julia look at refreshing your career through two lenses: moving on to another opportunity, or refreshing your current role. The answer isn't always jumping to a job that pays more, sometimes you can refresh your career by making change within your own organization.

Don't forget, the next episode is our 100th episode. We have a special surprise in store for you. The surprise might involve a new voice. And this is a voice you do not want to miss.

Also, Young PR Pros will be sponsoring the uOPRA conference Connect 2 Success. If you are attending the event, be sure to stop by and say hi to our host Kristine. Kristine will be appearing on a panel called Getting Started in the Field, as well as interviewing key speakers. We will be asking speakers to give us an example of the most impressive PR or communications move they have ever seen. We will share their responses and all our interviews over the coming months. This is the second time we participate at the uOPRA conference, check out the interviews with last year's speakers here.

As young PR and communications professionals, we are often expected to know everything about social media. That is why, this week on Young PR Pros our hosts Kristine D'Arbelles and Julia Kent talk about the most popular social networks, who uses them, and what companies might benefit from each platform.

The main lesson we want listeners to take away from this episode is that it doesn't matter if 1.5 billion or 300 million people are using a social network - doesn't mean your company NEEDS to be there. As a young professional entering a new job, make sure you ask your executives and your bosses what their business goals are.

And remember, if you are using social networks to build your professional brand you have your own business goals.

The rise of social media coupled with the growing importance of social responsibility are moving public relations professionals from the backroom, crafting press releases and organizing events, to the forefront of brand development and consumer engagement.

This is good news for young PR professionals. Our profession is finally showing its worth. Businesses are realizing the importance of the two-way communications of PR more than the message blasting of advertising.

So what should young professionals do with this news? Kristine and Julia make a few suggestions:

Relationships - and we are not talking about networking. When starting a new job think about how you are helping your organization build strong relationships with their clients, customers, stakeholders, etc.Listen - it is great to know how to Tweet and how to post an engaging post on Facebook, but none of that is worth anything if you don't listen to your followers and respond to their needs/comments/questions.Speed - listening means nothing if you can't respond in a timely manner. Of course, we don't expect organizations to respond within 30 seconds, but it shouldn't take more than 24 hours.

Stay tuned to our next episode where we talk about social media tools - such as Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc - and how they are best used.

Welcome back and welcome 2015! For our first episode of the year, we are doing a listener request. Bowda PR suggested we discuss 2015 trends young professionals - or any PR and communications professional - should be watching.

1. Tracking the impact of social media

Hootsuite says, 2015 is the year that the impact of social media on business gets easier to show and possibly impossible to ignore.

2. Owning owned media

According to Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer at MarketingProfs, 2015 will be the year we create and curate content customers want. The idea of brands as publishers will be more important.

3. Online advertising, testing and optimizing

Jay Baer, President, Convince & Convert says 2015 will be the year of paid amplification. With content marketing reaching near-ubiquity, the success pendulum will swing toward boosting consumption of content. That will put a new focus on math, testing and optimization as content production and content distribution become equally important.

In 2013, Forbes reported that one in five Americans work from home. That is almost 30 million people who work and live in the same area. For some working at home is a dream come true - you can make your own hours, no pressure of adhering to office politics and you can wear whatever you want. For others, working from home can be a complete disaster, no structure can cause stress and lack of productivity.

Regardless of where you fall, it is important to keep in mind the possibility of working from home as you hunt for a job. More and more public relations and communications agencies are going office-less, take Arment Dietrich as a good example. And with an uncertain job market, a lot of young professionals are starting out their careers as consultants working for themselves.

We all get a lot of email every day. Doesn't matter if you are a student or a professional, our inbox fills up very fast. This week, Kristine D'Arbelles and Julia Kent discuss a few simple rules for emailing that will help you get through your inbox faster and more efficiently. We get to hear about some of Julia's pet peeves for fun too!

Respond quickly.When writing an email, every word matters, and useless prose doesn’t.Clean out your inbox constantly.Handle email in LIFO order (Last In First Out).Remember, you’re a router.When you use the bcc (blind copy) feature, ask yourself why.Don’t yell.Make it easy to follow up on requests.Help your future self search for stuff.

Listen to this episode to learn more about the nine rules and find out which ones Kristine and Julia live by.

We want to hear from you! What are your email rules? Are there any of Eric Schmidt's rules you agree/disagree with?

Although not a completely new concept in PR and communications, blogger relations has grown into an excellent way to get your message out through a non-traditional gatekeeper. Back in the day, your only gatekeeper was journalists. If you wanted to be featured on the 6 o'clock news, you had to build relationships with the right journalists, editors, producers, etc. Today bloggers can be equally as powerful gatekeepers. In fact, some bloggers have a stronger and more dedicated followings through website hits and social media followers than the local newspaper. As a young professional entering their new career, don't discount the possibilities of a good blogger relations strategy.

To demonstrate the possibilities, Kristine and Julia share their experience as bloggers. Julia shares her experience as a book club blogger and how it landed her an interview on TV as a subject matter expert. Kristine shares her Cardel Homes story. Cardel, a local home builder, invited bloggers and their spouses to truly experience what a Cardel home has to offer - and what better way then to host a small get together complete with wine and delicious food. Bloggers got to experience first hand the versatility of the home. The Cardel example shows PR professionals and communicators that using blogger relations can go beyond the basic "pitch" and the online world.

The other lesson learned here is that young professionals are encouraged to take advantage of the blogger relations trend in PR and communications to make a name for themselves as they build a career. Improve your writing skills and get experience in social media strategies by building your own strategy to gain new followers and readers.

What about you? Have you started a blog to help build your personal brand? Do you have a good blogger relations story to share?